Shaun White Skateboarding won't just give players the chance to live out their skateboarding fantasies this fall; it'll give them the power to transform an entire city into the skate park of their dreams.

I was playing Skate 3 this past weekend when it occurred to me that I didn't like the Skate series, or any of the Tony Hawk series past number three. Why? Because skateboarding around a large, open world is boring. I loved the way the first Tony Hawk games split things up by level, with a set of goals to complete before moving on. It gave me a sense of purpose.

I mention this because my next thought was 'I sure hope Shaun White Skateboarding does something different.' I suppose transforming the world via the power of skateboarding is different.

Shaun White Skateboarding will start players off with a drab, boring old city, split up into districts. As players skate and complete challenges, new areas are unlocked. That's pretty standard.

What isn't boring is the power to change the city to make it more skater-friendly.

I'm, not talking about dropping ramps and rails via some sort of park editor. I'm talking lifting the street from the ground to create ramps, or twisting rails until they reach dizzying heights. Since each player will change the city in different ways, it's possible that no two cities will wind up the same. Creativity is key.

"When we started making the game, we knew we wanted to give players a sense of how skaters see the world – everything is an opportunity," said Nick Harper, Creative Director. "What looks like a handrail to us is really a grind. A park bench is a place to trick, an alley is a quarter pipe, etc. We've taken that idea and expanded it. We wanted to put our own twist on the genre and craft the type of game that allows players to be creative and still have a lot of fun."

The game will still have your skateboarding standards, like online multiplayer in both co-op and adversarial flavors, but the real drawl of Shaun White Skateboarding will be the way things change.